UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.
Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.
And we never give up.
For every child, a fair chance
Uganda is one of the over 190 countries and territories around the world where we work to overcome the obstacles that poverty, violence, disease, and discrimination place in a child’s path. Together with the Government of Uganda and partners we work towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals, the objectives of the Uganda National Development Plan, and the planned outcomes of the United Nations Development Assistance Framework.
Visit this link for more information on Uganda Country Office https://www.unicef.org/uganda/
How can you make a difference?
UNICEF Uganda is seeking to recruit a consultant to support MoH/ACP to strengthen the capacities for planning, implementation and monitoring of the paediatric HIV/AIDS programme with focus on the paediatric HIV care and treatment programme so that the country can begin to reverse the indicators that are lagging behind. The Paediatric HIV Care and Treatment Program officer will further support the key programme management roles including coordination and convergence of donor support, resource mobilization, knowledge management, research and financial management of the Paediatric HIV support.
The consultant will report to the HIV/AIDS Manager at UNICEF and the Senior Program Officer Paediatric and Adolescents HIV Care and Treatment at the Ministry. The consultant is expected to submit weekly updates, prepare monthly reports on progress of activity and share quarterly activity schedule to UNICEF and MOH.
The Consultant will be based at the MOH/ACP in Kampala with extensive travel to the regions. The consultant shall be shadowing the Ministry’s Senior Program Officer Paediatrics and Adolescents HIV Care and Treatment.
Background :
The paediatric and adolescent HIV unit at the Ministry of Health (MOH) AIDS Control Program (ACP) is responsible for the leadership and coordination of the national paediatric and adolescent HIV response. The core functions include coordination of all stakeholders offering a service for children and adolescents living with HIV; policy and guidelines development and dissemination; capacity building including curriculum development, training, mentorship and support supervision for quality services; utilization of routinely collected data for evidence-based implementation, research and innovation and resource mobilization.
The clinical cascade for children and adolescents living with HIV is still lagging behind compared to that of adults. One of the key constraints is the human resource capacity of the paediatric and adolescents’ unit in the Ministry. The unit was initially composed of 4 officers; the Senior Program Officer – Paediatrics and Adolescent HIV Care and treatment (Team Lead); The Program Officer – Paediatric HIV care and treatment; The Program Officer – Adolescent HIV care and treatment; and the Program Officer – Monitoring and Evaluation. Due to limited financial resources and human resource for health, the Program Officer for M&E was pooled to support the entire care and treatment portfolio, and the Team Lead was promoted to the position of the Care and Treatment Coordinator in June 2017 leaving the unit with 2 Officers; Senior Program Officer – Paediatrics and Adolescent HIV Care and treatment (Team Lead) and the Program Officer – Adolescent HIV care and treatment.
With the ambitious targets aimed at achieving the epidemic control the unit needs one officer for Paediatrics to function more effectively. This will enable the team lead to focus more on strategic thinking for the Paediatrics and adolescent HIV services, stakeholder engagement, resource mobilization, generation of more evidence-based interventions to improve the program and supervision as well as mentorship for the program officers in the unit.
The unit therefore currently requires a full time Program Officer – Paediatric HIV care and treatment, to support the implementation of the various components of the paediatric HIV program in collaboration with relevant AIDS Development Partners, DLGs and implementing partners as well as the internal MoH teams including M and E, care and treatment, PMTCT/EID, Quality improvement, Laboratory and supply chain.
Scope of work :
The following key assignments have been discussed and agreed with the MoH ACP :
- Strengthen the implementation of the paediatric HIV programme by supporting :
- Roll-out of the revised paediatric and HIV guideline ;
- Capacity building for Implementing Partners, district and health facility teams on the guideline’s application ;
- Plan implement and document technical supportive supervision visits.
- Scale up of quality of care approaches in high burden districts for 20,000 children contributing to 60 per cent of the unmet need of paediatric HIV services ;
- Support MoH to coordinate the implementation of capacity building activities for the national third-line ART as well as the review of the HIV drug results ;
- Monitor the implementation and dissemination of findings of the operational research being conducted in the unit e.g. the HIV drug resistance baseline assessment for children failing on first-line ART, including a costing component.
Coordination of the MOH and UAC collaborative streams of work related to Paediatric HIV Planning, Reporting and accountability functions for national Paediatric HIV workplans funded by donors including UNICEF
Key tasks :
The consultant will work on the following tasks :
- Roll-out of the recently revised paediatric and adolescent’s HIV case-based training package and newly developed dispensing messages for health care workers to caregivers and adolescents with subsequent technical support supervision visits ;
- Support to implementing partners and district teams to optimize treatment for over 20,000 children and adolescents who are currently receiving sub-optimal regimens including coordinating weekly accountability meetings ;
- Technical support toward the implementation of the national paediatric and adolescent quality improvement collaborative with 50 district bases coaches to support facilities contributing 60 per cent of the unmet need for paediatric HIV services ;
- Coordination of the national third-line ART capacity building activities as well as the review of the HIV drug results- weekly virtual meetings ;
- Conduct bi-annual regional meetings for implementing partners supporting the poorly performing regions in Paediatrics and adolescent’s HIV services as well as quarterly implementing partners stakeholders’ meetings and the paediatric and adolescent ART sub-committee meetings ;
- Technical support implementation research assessments to further improve paediatric and adolescent HIV services. These include; HIV drug resistance baseline assessment for children failing on first-line ART, an assessment to evaluate the impact on paediatric and adolescent HIV services, and the HIV self-testing study for caregivers of children living with HIV.
To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…
The selected consultant should have :
- Advanced university degree in Paediatrics and child health, Public Health or other related academic fields ;
- At least five to eight years of relevant experience working in the areas of public health, HIV and /or development ;
- Comprehensive technical knowledge and skills for HIV programming, with focus on paediatric and adolescent’s HIV work ;
- Experience conducting operations research ;
- Proven ability to manage complex partnerships ;
- High level of initiative and ability to navigate challenges in prioritization to complete tasks and deliverables in a timely manner is essential ;
- Strong interpersonal communication ;
- Strong qualitative and quantitative analytic skills and report writing skill ;
- Excellent written and oral communication skills in English and strong presentation skills.
Application Procedure/Call for Proposals :
Interested candidates are required to submit a technical proposal on how they intend to approach the work. The proposal should include a timeline, and methodology, based on the Terms of Reference. The proposal must also include detailed CV of the consultant, as well as a financial proposal, clearly indicating daily rate for professional fees. The financial proposal must be all-inclusive of all costs (consultancy fees and where applicable air fares, airport transfers, daily living expenses). This is an international level consultancy and competitive market rates should apply.
Evaluation of Candidate :
The consultant will be competitively selected from a list of applicants based on their past experience of doing similar work (extensive experience in writing donor reports, in compiling and editing annual reports for various UNICEF offices).
For every Child, you demonstrate…
UNICEF’s core values of Commitment, Diversity and Integrity and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.
The competencies required for this post are….
View our competency framework at : UNICEF_Competencies.pdf
UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.
UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.
Remarks : Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.